Sūtras

The teachings of the Buddha, and of the first generations of teachers that followed him, were kept alive as an oral tradition. These Sūtras (or Suttas in Pali) were carefully memorized and passed down to those students who would become the continuation of each lineage. Somewhere around the 1st century BCE, we find the earliest written records.

Over the centuries, these teachings have been revised many times, and Buddhist principals have flowed from past into the present, and from present into the future, in separate yet parallel rivers of thought and practice. Here we have collected the principal teachings as translated by our teacher, Zen master Thích Nhất Hạnh, that guide our practice in the Plum Village tradition.